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The Jews took no one's land
WorldNetDaily ^ | joseph farah

Posted on 06/05/2002 2:14:21 PM PDT by lucy1

As the most visible Arab-American critic of Yasser Arafat and the phony "Palestinian" agenda, I get a lot of hate mail.

I've even received more than my share of death threats.

Most of those who attack me – at least those who bother to get beyond the four-letter words and insults – say I just don't understand or have sympathy for these poor Arabs who were displaced, chased out of their homes and turned into refugees by the Israelis.

Let me state this plainly and clearly: The Jews in Israel took no one's land.

When Mark Twain visited the Holy Land in the 19th century, he was greatly disappointed. He didn't see any people. He referred to it as a vast wasteland. The land we now know as Israel was practically deserted.

By the beginning of the 20th century, that began to change. Jews from all over the world began to return to their ancestral homeland – the Promised Land Moses and Joshua had conquered millennia earlier, Christians and Jews believe, on the direct orders of God.

That's not to say there wasn't always a strong Jewish presence in the land – particularly in and around Jerusalem. In 1854, according to a report in the New York Tribune, Jews constituted two-thirds of the population of that holy city. The source for that statistic? A journalist on assignment in the Middle East that year for the Tribune. His name was Karl Marx. Yes, that Karl Marx.

A travel guide to Palestine and Syria, published in 1906 by Karl Baedeker, illustrates the fact that, even when the Islamic Ottoman Empire ruled the region, the Muslim population in Jerusalem was minimal. The book estimates the total population of the city at 60,000, of whom 7,000 were Muslims, 13,000 were Christians and 40,000 were Jews.

"The number of Jews has greatly risen in the last few decades, in spite of the fact that they are forbidden to immigrate or to possess landed property," the book states.Even though the Jews were persecuted, still they came to Jerusalem and represented the overwhelming majority of the population as early as 1906. And even though Muslims today claim Jerusalem as the third holiest site in Islam, when the city was under Islamic rule, they had little interest in it.

As the Jews came, drained the swamps and made the deserts bloom, something interesting began to happen. Arabs followed. I don't blame them. They had good reason to come. They came for jobs. They came for prosperity. They came for freedom. And they came in large numbers.

Winston Churchill observed in 1939: "So far from being persecuted, the Arabs have crowded into the country and multiplied till their population has increased more than even all world Jewry could lift up the Jewish population."

Then came 1948 and the great partition. The United Nations proposed the creation of two states in the region – one Jewish, one Arab. The Jews accepted it gratefully. The Arabs rejected it with a vengeance and declared war.

Arab leaders urged Arabs to leave the area so they would not be caught in the crossfire. They could return to their homes, they were told, after Israel was crushed and the Jews destroyed. It didn't work out that way. By most counts, several hundred thousand Arabs were displaced by this war – not by Israeli aggression, not by some Jewish real-estate grab, not by Israeli expansionism.

In fact, there are many historical records showing the Jews urged the Arabs to stay and live with them in peace. But, tragically, they chose to leave.

Fifty-four years later, the sons and daughters and grandsons and granddaughters of those refugees are all-too-often still living in refugee camps – not because of Israeli intransigence, but because they are misused as a political tool of the Arab powers.

Those poor unfortunates could be settled in a week by the rich Arab oil states that control 99.9 percent of the Middle East landmass, but they are kept as virtual prisoners, filled with misplaced hatred for Jews and armed as suicide martyrs by the Arab power brokers.

This is the modern real history of the Arab-Israeli conflict. At no time did the Jews uproot Arab families from their homes. When there were title deeds to be purchased, they bought them at inflated prices. When there were not, they worked the land so they could have a place to live without the persecution they faced throughout the world.

It's a great big lie that the Israelis displaced anyone – one of a series of lies and myths that have the world on the verge of committing yet another great injustice to the Jews.


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; Israel
KEYWORDS: jews; land
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Hope nobody posted this one before. A friend just forwarded it to me. I thought it was an interesting perspective.
1 posted on 06/05/2002 2:14:22 PM PDT by lucy1
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To: lucy1
The truth's a bitch, isn't it, Yassar?
2 posted on 06/05/2002 2:18:34 PM PDT by pabianice
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To: lucy1
The same argument can be made for the American Southwest. The Atzlan movement that wants to take it back for Mexico overlooks the fact that, at the time of the Mexican American War, there were fewer than 75,000 (Mexican) people living in California, New Mexico, Arizona, Texas, and parts of Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma and Utah. Only after the Americans had made it a prosperous, productive area, despite a lack of water, did the Mexicans renew their interest in actually living there, as opposed to claiming it as territory.
3 posted on 06/05/2002 2:20:45 PM PDT by 3AngelaD
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To: lucy1
I've never seen this particular article, but I have read similar ones before. It is well worth reading again. The bottom line is this: There never was any such thing as a palestinian in the sense that this term is used today. "Palestine" was a term used to mean "the land of the bible", and anyone living in this region was a "palestinian", regardless of race, religion, or culture. THe Arabs hijacked this term to add credibility to their bogus claims.
4 posted on 06/05/2002 2:27:12 PM PDT by mamelukesabre
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To: lucy1
Its a great article...nothing like facts and the truth. Too bad the New York Times have given up on the concept. The Pravda of Liberalism has decided that such facts get in the way of creating another violent Anti-American State. And if a few million Jews have to bite the dust in the process who cares.

Its why facts as these are never reported and the Jewish American community has chosen to be liberals first and Jews second. Thats why one does not hear it from them.

Its pretty sad, that Israel has to relly on an Arab-American (Farah) and Conservative Christians for support.

I'm glad you posted it.

5 posted on 06/05/2002 2:29:00 PM PDT by dinok
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To: veronica; dennisw
Joseph Farah bump.
6 posted on 06/05/2002 2:33:08 PM PDT by Ancesthntr
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To: lucy1

7 posted on 06/05/2002 2:33:46 PM PDT by drq
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To: lucy1
Yeah, and the Stern Gang was the local version of "welcome wagon."

On April 9, 1948 the combined forces of the Stern Gang and the Irgun (military arm of the Revisionist party, commanded by Menachem Begin, later Prime Minister) carried out reprisals in the Arab village of Deir Yassin.

Twenty-three men were led off to a quarry and executed in cold blood, and between 90 and 230 others were shot down in the village.

Menachim Begin's statement afterwards:

"Accept my congratulations on this splendid act of conquest...."

"A SPLENDID ACT OF CONQUEST".

8 posted on 06/05/2002 2:33:55 PM PDT by Who is George Salt?
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To: 3AngelaD
Yep. Even though I'm not in favor of the atzlan movement, I still gotta admit I see some irony in the situation.

In the frontier days, there were many many english speaking white people multiplying like rabbits and spreading accross the continent. The indians were dissapearing almost as fast as the buffalo, and mexicans were scarce too. The mexican government saw that there was no way to avoid the tidal wave of white settlers, so they cooked up a plan to "mexicanize" the white people that moved into texas. They failed, and the "alamo" was the result of their scheming.

Now the reverse is happening. White people are scarce(relatively speaking) and a tidal wave of mexican immigrants is flooding in and multiplying like rabbits. The US government is basically giving up and talking about things like "amnesty" and such. I have a bad feeling that there will be a new "alamo" and this time the mexicans will win.
9 posted on 06/05/2002 2:36:12 PM PDT by mamelukesabre
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To: lucy1
No crawling into a millenium hole for Farah this time. Well met.
10 posted on 06/05/2002 2:37:06 PM PDT by onedoug
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To: veronica; College_Repub; Lent; dennisw
bump
11 posted on 06/05/2002 2:37:15 PM PDT by weikel
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To: dinok
Good article. Needs reading in order to refute the liars who blast Israel around here.
12 posted on 06/05/2002 2:38:20 PM PDT by justshutupandtakeit
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To: lucy1
When Mark Twain visited the Holy Land in the 19th century, he was greatly disappointed. He didn't see any people. He referred to it as a vast wasteland. The land we now know as Israel was practically deserted.

Farah is lying, and stupidly, because it's easy enough to see what Twain wrote:

The population of Jerusalem is composed of Moslems, Jews, Greeks, Latins, Armenians, Syrians, Copts, Abyssinians, Greek Catholics, and a handful of Protestants. One hundred of the latter sect are all that dwell now in this birthplace of Christianity. The nice shades of nationality comprised in the above list, and the languages spoken by them, are altogether too numerous to mention. It seems to me that all the races and colors and tongues of the earth must be represented among the fourteen thousand souls that dwell in Jerusalem.

From The Innocents Abroad, Chapter 53

And oh yes - Twain repeatedly refers to the country as "Palestine".

13 posted on 06/05/2002 2:43:12 PM PDT by Romulus
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To: mamelukesabre
...and this time the mexicans will win...

Er, I hate to break it to you, but the Mexicans won the battle at the Alamo.

14 posted on 06/05/2002 3:01:16 PM PDT by brbethke
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To: Romulus
the fourteen thousand souls that dwell in Jerusalem

Oops -- maybe you should have left out this part, as it destroys your argument (a land where the Big City[tm] has a population of 14,000 is rather empty, even by mid-19th century standards).

15 posted on 06/05/2002 3:02:18 PM PDT by steve-b
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To: Romulus
And oh yes - Twain repeatedly refers to the country as "Palestine".

That's because the Jews referred to themselves as Palestinians. Note that Twain referred to what you call "Palestinians" as Moslems. They called themselves either Moslems or Arabs until after 1948, when they decided that they were really Palestinians. Their new "Palestinian" name didn't really catch on until the 1960s.

Did you know that the Jerusalem Post (founded and operated by Jews) used to be named the Palestine Post? Note this historic page from the Palestine Post. Also, what is now the Israeli Philharmonic was originally the Palestine Philharmonic, and today's Israel Electric Company was originally the Palestine Electric Company. You could learn something by reading Joe Farah.

16 posted on 06/05/2002 3:05:47 PM PDT by DallasMike
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To: brbethke
haha

Boy did i screw that up!
I meant in the long run. THey won the alamo, but because of the alamo, they got thrashed really really good.

Maybe this'll teach me to stop doing 3 things at once on the computer, but I doubt it.
17 posted on 06/05/2002 3:08:45 PM PDT by mamelukesabre
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To: Romulus
Why didn't you post the complete paragraph?

The population of Jerusalem is composed of Moslems, Jews, Greeks, Latins, Armenians, Syrians, Copts, Abyssinians, Greek Catholics, and a handful of Protestants. One hundred of the latter sect are all that dwell now in this birthplace of Christianity. The nice shades of nationality comprised in the above list, and the languages spoken by them, are altogether too numerous to mention. It seems to me that all the races and colors and tongues of the earth must be represented among the fourteen thousand souls that dwell in Jerusalem. Rags, wretchedness, poverty and dirt, those signs and symbols that indicate the presence of Moslem rule more surely than the crescent-flag itself, abound. Lepers, cripples, the blind, and the idiotic, assail you on every hand, and they know but one word of but one language apparently -- the eternal "bucksheesh." To see the numbers of maimed, malformed and diseased humanity that throng the holy places and obstruct the gates, one might suppose that the ancient days had come again, and that the angel of the Lord was expected to descend at any moment to stir the waters of Bethesda. Jerusalem is mournful, and dreary, and lifeless. I would not desire to live here.

Mark Twain, Innocents Abroad, Chapter 53

18 posted on 06/05/2002 3:09:56 PM PDT by KayEyeDoubleDee
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To: KayEyeDoubleDee
Mark Twain said what Farah claimed he said. Twain talked about Palestine sitting in "sackcloth and ashes" and as being undeveloped.
19 posted on 06/05/2002 3:11:40 PM PDT by UbIwerks
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To: lucy1
Thanks for a nice post -- to you and Mr. Farah!
20 posted on 06/05/2002 3:12:00 PM PDT by bvw
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